Wicked, Man
by Shenzuul
Summary: In which Danny reaps the consequences of his carelessness in the locker room.


"Wicked scar, man."

Danny froze. The voice seemed to be directed at him. He glanced behind himself and met the eyes of a boy he didn't recognize. He was probably one of the seniors from the P.E. class just before Danny's—for a few minutes every day, the boys' locker room was shared by upperclassmen changing into their casual wear while freshmen changed into gym clothes. The senior nodded at Danny's right side. Craning his neck to look at the back of his shoulder, Danny realized that his sleeveless shirt exposed the edge of a scar on his tricep.

He cursed himself silently for his carelessness. Every now and then, an enemy managed to land a blow on him while he was in his human form, and although his human body healed as quickly as his ghost one, human skin retained scars that spectral flesh did not. He usually tried to keep these scars hidden; it would not be a good idea to draw attention to his wounds. Fortunately, most of his enemies were ghosts, and since most ectoplasm-based bodies regenerated lost or damaged limbs quite easily, ghost-fighting mainly targeted the torso, which was easy to cover with normal clothing post-battle. It appeared, however, that he had become too complacent.

"How'd you get it?"

Danny blinked. "Huh?"

"The scar, man," said the senior, chuckling at Danny's distraction. "How'd you get it?"

"Um." Danny squinted at the scar, and a vague memory of the ghost that had given to him floated to his consciousness. "Cat," he mumbled.

"_Cat?"_ repeated the senior, incredulous. "Must've been pretty fierce! Look at that thing, it's so long it even goes onto your back!" Danny, whose reflexes were less than average when he was in his human form, wasn't fast enough to dodge when the senior grabbed the back of his shirt and yanked it upward to get a better look at the scar. "Whoa," the senior breathed. Several other sharp intakes of air told Danny that more than a few of the other boys in the locker room had turned to look at what had drawn the senior's attention.

Even as Danny's face began to flush with embarrassment, he mentally mapped what the onlookers were seeing, calculating the damage of exposure. The scar that started on his tricep stretched across his shoulder blade and was joined by two more parallel lines as it curved down over his back to his left hip. The thickest scar started on top of his left shoulder, but was less than a foot long. There was a burn scar on his hip—maybe they wouldn't notice that, it was mostly covered by his shorts—and on the opposite side, just below his ribs, a curved scar that hopefully wasn't too easily recognizable as a bite mark. Then the gore wound, and a couple of other random scratches that crossed the ghost lion's claw marks in a couple of places. Danny held his breath. That wasn't too conspicuous, right?

"Woh-hoa," said the senior again. He sounded impressed. "What's _this_ one from?" He poked the bite mark.

_Bear,_ Danny recalled.

Apparently, he said it aloud, for the senior heard him. "A bear, and a cat? What are you, some kind of hunter?"

Danny scrambled for a response. "Uh, yeah, my dad…likes to take me out…on weekends…" Out fishing, he didn't bother to clarify. Fishing was almost the same thing as hunting anyway. Killing animals for food out in the wilderness with toys you didn't get to use back at home. An activity Sam did _not_ approve of.

"_Extreme_ hunting, maybe," someone piped up. One of the senior's buddies was leaning around him for a better look at Danny's back. "Actually, that's kind of awesome."

Danny, by now bright red, struggled to pull his shirt down. The senior holding him laughed and let go. "Sorry, dude. Don't get mad." The warning bell for the next class sounded. "Guess I gotta go," the senior said. "See you around. Bet you have some awesome stories to tell." He waved at Danny and left the locker room.

_Definitely _won't _be seeing you around,_ Danny thought. He sighed, resigned to a year of scrambling into his gym clothes in the last thirty seconds before class. He'd need to invent some excuses for being consistently tardy. Still, he couldn't help but feel the tiniest bit pleased. It wasn't much, but someone had recognized him. Not as boring Danny Fenton, but as someone who was maybe just a bit more, someone who carried scars and had stories to tell.


End file.
